Vanishing England eBook

The vanishing of prehistoric monuments is due to various
causes. Avebury had at one time within a great
rampart and a fosse, which is still forty feet deep,
a large circle of rough unhewn stones, and within
this two circles each containing a smaller concentric
circle. Two avenues of stones led to the two
entrances to the space surrounded by the fosse.
It must have been a vast and imposing edifice, much
more important than Stonehenge, and the area within
this great circle exceeds twenty-eight acres, with
a diameter of twelve hundred feet. But the spoilers
have been at work, and “Farmer George”
and other depredators have carted away so many of
the stones, and done so much damage, that much imagination
is needed to construct in the eye of the mind this
wonder of the world.

Every one who journeys from London to Oxford by the
Great Western Railway knows the appearance of the
famous Wittenham Clumps, a few miles from historic
Wallingford. If you ascend the hill you will find
it a paradise for antiquaries. The camp itself
occupies a commanding position overlooking the valley
of the Thames, and has doubtless witnessed many tribal
fights, and the great contest between the Celts and
the Roman invaders. In the plain beneath is another
remarkable earthwork. It was defended on three
sides by the Thames, and a strong double rampart had
been made across the cord of the bow formed by the
river. There was also a trench which in case of
danger could have been filled with water. But
the spoiler has been at work here. In 1870 a
farmer employed his men during a hard winter in digging
down the west side of the rampart and flinging the
earth into the fosse. The farmer intended to
perform a charitable act, and charity is said to cover
a multitude of sins; but his action was disastrous
to antiquaries and has almost destroyed a valuable
prehistoric monument. There is a noted camp at
Ashbury, erroneously called “Alfred’s Castle,”
on an elevated part of Swinley Down, in Berkshire,
not far from Ashdown Park, the seat of the Earl of
Craven. Lysons tells us that formerly there were
traces of buildings here, and Aubrey says that in his
time the earthworks were “almost quite defaced
by digging for sarsden stones to build my Lord Craven’s
house in the park.” Borough Hill Camp,
in Boxford parish, near Newbury, has little left, so
much of the earth having been removed at various times.
Rabbits, too, are great destroyers, as they disturb
the original surface of the ground and make it difficult
for investigators to make out anything with certainty.

Sometimes local tradition, which is wonderfully long-lived,
helps the archaeologist in his discoveries. An
old man told an antiquary that a certain barrow in
his parish was haunted by the ghost of a soldier who
wore golden armour. The antiquary determined to
investigate and dug into the barrow, and there found
the body of a man with a gold or bronze breastplate.
I am not sure whether the armour was gold or bronze.
Now here is an amazing instance of folk-memory.
The chieftain was buried probably in Anglo-Saxon times,
or possibly earlier. During thirteen hundred
years, at least, the memory of that burial has been
handed down from father to son until the present day.
It almost seems incredible.